Marketing-to-Sales Handoff SLA Template: the agreement that fits on one page

The template includes three components that turn a verbal agreement into a measurable process: a qualification criteria table (MQL, Hand-Raise, PQL, and SQL with their exact conditions), a response-time table by lane (Marketing, SDR, Sales), and an owner log where you write down who is accountable for each handoff and how compliance is measured. It ships in two formats: an editable spreadsheet and a one-page version to print.

The spreadsheet is for working: it has cells with pre-filled examples you replace with your company's data, basic formulas to calculate the SLA compliance percentage, and notes explaining each field. The one-page version is so the team keeps it in plain sight, without opening a twenty-page document nobody reads.

What matters is not the file, it is what it forces you to decide. To fill it in, you have to agree, in writing, on things that today live inside each person's head: what a sales-ready lead is, how many hours until first contact, what happens if contact never comes. That conversation, forced by the template, is worth more than the document itself.

You fill in the criteria by defining, for each lead type, the exact conditions it must meet to move from one lane to the next. An MQL is a lead that showed interest through behavior (downloaded something, visited the pricing page) but has not yet asked to talk. A Hand-Raise raised their hand explicitly: requested a demo, messaged on WhatsApp, filled out a contact form. Those two are not the same and are not worked the same way.

A PQL is a product-qualified lead: used a free version or trial, and that usage signals they have the problem you solve. An SQL is a lead that already went through a qualification conversation, and a rep confirmed there is fit, budget, and timing. In the template, each one has a row where you write its concrete entry conditions, not adjectives. Instead of 'interested lead,' you write 'visited pricing + opened 2 emails in 7 days.'

The golden rule when filling this section: if two people look at the same lead and the template does not lead them to the same conclusion, the criterion is poorly written. Be specific with thresholds, sources, and time windows. That specificity is what kills the 'the leads are bad' versus 'sales does not work them' argument, because now both sides look at the same definition.

You set response times by assigning each lead type a maximum window within which the responsible lane must make first contact. The most expensive rule to ignore is for Hand-Raises: a lead that raises their hand gets contacted in minutes, not days. Harvard Business Review research found that companies contacting a new lead within the first hour are nearly 7 times more likely to qualify it than those that wait one more hour, and 60 times more likely than those that wait 24 hours.

In the template you write one row per scenario: Hand-Raise contacted by SDR in under 1 business hour, MQL nurtured by marketing until it meets SQL criteria, PQL contacted by sales in under 24 hours. You set the numbers based on your team and your hours, but the template forces you to commit to a number instead of an 'as soon as possible' that means nothing.

A response time without a consequence is a wish, not an SLA. That is why the adjacent column asks what happens when it is missed: the lead is reassigned, escalated to the lane lead, or returned to the queue. If you do not define the consequence, the response time becomes decorative and you are back where you started.

You log the owner by assigning a name, not a team, to each step of the handoff. 'Marketing' is not an owner; a specific person accountable for delivering the MQL on time is. The template has an owner column for every transition and a metric column that defines how you know it was met: percentage of Hand-Raises contacted within SLA, percentage of SQLs accepted by sales, leads returned for failing the criteria.

Compliance is measured with one simple number the sheet produces on its own: of every hundred leads that crossed the handoff this month, how many were worked within the agreed window. If that number is below 80 or 90 percent, you have a process conversation, not an opinion fight. The template includes a compliance cell that calculates that percentage as you log the real handoffs.

This changes the weekly commercial meeting. Instead of arguing over gut feelings, you look at the table: this lane met SLA, this one did not, this lead was returned because it lacked the data the SLA requires. The conversation shifts from who is to blame to which part of the system needs adjusting. That is the difference between a team that improves and one that argues.

You adapt the template by collapsing lanes, not by dropping the agreement. If you have no dedicated SDR, the same person who sells also prospects and qualifies, so you merge the SDR and Sales rows into a single lane and keep the criteria and times. The handoff stops being between two people and becomes a handoff between two moments in one person's day: the block where they answer Hand-Raises and the block where they advance opportunities.

In small teams the SLA matters more, not less. When one person does everything, leads fall through because there is no system telling them what gets attention first. The template, filled in for a team of one or two people, becomes the rule that protects hot leads from being buried under operational tasks. You mark the Hand-Raise as absolute priority and everything else waits for its block.

The one-page version is especially useful here: you stick it next to your screen, and it works as the reminder that a lead who asked to talk does not wait until tomorrow. You do not need an expensive CRM or a RevOps team to make the SLA work; you need it written, simple, and looked at every day.

You connect the SLA to the commercial loop by placing it at the exact transition where a lead crosses from Qualify to Sale. The handoff is not an isolated step: it is the seam between the work of marketing and SDR (attract, convert, qualify) and the work of sales (close). If that seam is loose, all the effort upstream is lost right before it turns into money. The SLA is what keeps the seam tight.

For it to live in the process and not in a drawer, the SLA has to be tied to a real qualification moment. Saying 'this lead is an SQL' is one thing; having confirmed it in a structured qualification conversation is another. When a call confirms there is pain, impact, and a decision, that lead meets your template's SQL criterion objectively, not by hunch. That is when the document stops being theory.

The way to keep it out of a drawer is to review it every time you look at the pipeline. The SLA is not a document you sign once; it is the rule you consult every week when you count how many handoffs were met. If you connect it to your commercial review routine, the agreement stays alive and the team stops operating on feelings and starts operating on process.